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JERUSALEM, October 16, 2012 (WAFA) – Members of the all-Israeli municipality of West Jerusalem Tuesday handed a Palestinian family living in Silwan an order to demolish their home, according to the house owner.

Dawood Siam told WAFA that an Israeli force handed him five demolition orders, three of them concern his family home and the other two for his brothers’ homes.

The Israeli municipality runs a campaign to demolish dozens of homes in Silwan, an all Palestinian neighborhood in occupied East Jerusalem, under the pretext of building without permit.

Palestinians say they are forced to build without permit because the municipality does not grant residents building permit or even building expansion, but it is quick to issue demolition orders when people build out of need.

“We have been trying for years without success to obtain a building permit from the Israeli authority, which does not grant it because it wants the Palestinian residents to leave the area as a prelude to take over the land and give it to Jewish settlers,” said Siam.

He said this is the second time his family got a demolition notice for their home, the first was in 1996, stressing that his family will never leave its home and land and would rather live in a tent on their land if Israel carries out the demolition order.

T.R./M.S.